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These days it seems like the film, and soundtrack, are all but forgotten even though in many ways this was Jeff Tweedys first solo album. Chelsea Walls came at the apex of a difficult time for Tweedy and Wilco. Though the band has, in recent years, emerged into something like the greatest living rock band in the US, 2001 was the make or break year that saw the band sever ties with its old label over Yankee Hotel Foxtrot a slew of band changes and the eventual solidification of the lineup to make way for what the band has become today (see I am Trying to Break Your Heart). Accompanying this was a kind of restlessness both among the band leader, Tweedy, and the group itself as it seemed like no one seemed content to just be in Wilco, but thad to be in everything else as well. For instance, the whole band teamed with the Minus 5 in 2003s Down with Wilco and a shortened paring of the YHF and Ghost is Born team (Kotche, Tweedy, and Wilco/Sonic Youth collaborator Jim ORourke) dubbed themselves Loose Fur and released a self-titled record in 2003 as well. It was an era of musical experimentation, to put it mildly, and for Tweedy the most experimental was probably his soundtrack for Hawkes Chelsea Walls. 

The album itself features 6 tracks form Tweedy backed, usually, by Wilco/Loose Fur member Glen Kotche. The other 5 tracks feature 2 from Wilco. "Promising," a vintage Being There sounding recording (of the "Someone Elses Song" variety) and "When the Roses Bloom Again" from the bands Mermaid Ave sessions with Billy Bragg. Other standouts are Leonard and Zahns Wilco cover and Jimmy Scotts incendiary rendition of John Lennons "Jealous Guy," which you can also catch in the film.

Still, its Tweedys music that dominates the soundtrack as it does the film acting as almost an absent character whose presence pervades like the haunted quality of Chelsea Hotel itself. Tweedys composing here relies heavily on tricks that he seems to be picking up from Jim ORourke. "Red Elevator" sounds like its main riff could have crawled out of the Sonic Youths Sonic Nurse sessions which ORourke was a part of. The fuzzy melange of sounds on "Red Elevator" gets repeated over and over in Tweedys score which moves as easily from an acoustic moment with piano as it does with overlapping squeals. For fans of the bands work on Ghost is Born, you can feel the building blocks in Tweedys work on this score as he seems to throw a ton of sounds in and see which one sticks. Sometimes, as on "Franks Dream" the result is an akimbo jazzy recording with Kotches drums seemingly the only thing holding the track together. Others, as on "Finale," a single riff seems to turn the universe around it drawing in new sounds and expanding other lines. 

Pitchfork, in their trademarked snark, advised listeners that in the future only Wilco completeists would be interested in Tweedys first recording under his own name and even then, they might regret what they had just gotten themselves into. 12 years after its release, I cant help but think that this record has been unjustly judged back then and remains unjustly out of the picture right now. First of all, theres the importance in terms of Wilcos transformation. But, beyond that, the soundtrack to Chelsea Walls is a thoroughly decent instrumental record with a couple great b-sides that you cant find anywhere else and two fantastic covers (Scotts and Leonard/Zahns). Its probably fitting to end this post with the covers, as the version that Leonard and Zahn perform of Tweedys music is one of the most revelatory moments of the film and the soundtrack. And as much as this is Leonard and Zahns awkward portrayal of aspiring musicians (esp. Leonards scene in the phonebook toward the end of the film) its also based on the sheer strength of Tweedys songwriting, which is somehow continually overlooked. This film made "The Lonely 1" into one of my favorite songs of all time and for me, at least for that, its difficult to continually forget about Chelsea Walls.